I LOVE freedom… until I disagree with it

An interesting issue arose recently when Sarah A. Hoyt linked to my “Unintended Consequences” essay on Instapundit. A commenter with the moniker “Billy Boy” decided to petulantly request that my blog no longer be linked on Insty. Why? Because I’m apparently “crass,” and he’s upset about my language. Apparently, when he ambled over here (not sure when) to complain about what I write on my site, I failed to kiss his lily-white ass and acknowledge his superiority on matters of what should be posted on my site and how.

Please stop referencing this woman. (emphasis mine)

Even if she is correct (sometimes), her rantings are filled with rhetorical fallacies, taking ad hominem to the stratospheric heights. If you can’t make your point without profanity laced screed, then just shut up. (emphasis mine)

I posted a small side objection on her website and was met with derision and vitriol. She is a crass boor and most certainly is not interested in free and open discussion. (emphasis mine) Definitely not worthy of instapundit readers’ time.

Let’s take this apart a bit.

“Please stop referencing this woman” — Instapundit is a site that provides free content to its readers, as well as an ability to comment. Billy Boy feels himself entitled to demand that a site for which he does not pay and that does not belong to him tailor content to his likes and dislikes.

“If you can’t make your point without profanity laced screed, then just shut up.” — Never mind I make points without using profanity all the time. But aside from that little matter… just shut up? So, if Billy Boy doesn’t like your language you should just not speak out? My, my… how interesting and SJWish!

“I posted a small side objection on her website and was met with derision and vitriol. She is a crass boor and most certainly is not interested in free and open discussion.Definitely not worthy of instapundit readers’ time.” — So Billy Boy came over here to admonish me about my language (note, I have no idea who this pedantic fucknugget is or to which comment he’s referring). On a site for which I pay. On a site that is mine. And apparently, he’s butthurt, because he was ridiculed for his entitled attitude in telling another person how they should communicate on their own site. This, of course, in his puny little mind translates to not being “interested in free and open discussion.” Let’s remember, he was not in any way moderated or prevented from making his arrogant comments. His comment was not edited (I don’t do that, and I only screen for spam and overt threats). But apparently ridiculing him for attempting to arrogantly demand that I alter my site and my language, when it is pretty clearly stated that I have no interest in making converts or conforming to anyone else’s standards but my own, to fit his ideal of a website is somehow equivalent to suppressing his ability to hold a free and open discussion. How SJWish of him!

Additionally, this presumptuous bag of hubris has apparently also made himself the arbiter of what is appropriate and what is not on Insty.

To link this screed generator from the instapundit site is far below the dignity of Professor Reynolds.

Go read some of Professor Reynolds many essays which are carried by USA Today and get back with us if you can spot the difference.

Let me make this perfectly clear. I have had enough. If you want to talk about how you believe in freedom of speech, then you’d better put your money where your mouth is. Freedom of speech isn’t trying to shut down speech you don’t like or agree with. Freedom of speech isn’t trying to cost people their jobs when you don’t like what they say. Yes, they can be the biggest fucking douche-wad there is but as long as their speech doesn’t violate the First Amendment, shut the fuck up about silencing them.

Amanda made a great point earlier. Social Justice Warrior Howler Monkeys love freedom only on their terms. These same people claimed they were expanding science fiction when, in fact, they worked to silence voices that did not agree with their views. These are the same people who tried to force Baen Publishing to pressure Brad Torgersen and others supporting Sad Puppies 3 to shut up or they would be cut loose from the house. How is silencing one group of fans, because they do not agree with your point of view, “expanding” anything?

Here’s a clue. It isn’t.

Silencing your opposition is not the same as promoting your point of view.

It’s the sign of a miserable mediocrity trying to get ahead – not by producing superior writing or advancing a superior argument, but by trying to cripple its opponent a la Tanya Harding.

Demanding that others conform to your standards, and if not, that they should be silenced makes you a petty little despot wannabe, but certainly not anyone who actually loves and respects freedom, no matter how much you screech to the contrary! (And yes, I fully realize the First Amendment protects you from government prosecution if you dare speak out. However, demanding that someone whose speech you don’t like be silenced by anyone, be it an employer or a news aggregator, still makes you a petty little tyrannical fuck.)

And finally, there’s this little thing called a “mouse,” which you can use to navigate away from sites you don’t like. There are also things called “power buttons,” which you can use to turn off television and radio programs that don’t appeal to you. And, believe it or not, there are other things called “books,” which you can either close or not purchase altogether if you don’t like their content.

Those Special Snowflakes who are too lazy or too pompous to do any of the above, but who insist that others conform to their worldview to save themselves the effort of making a logical argument or opening their minds to new challenges, while demanding a safe space to hide from naughty language as an excuse for said negligence, can go fuck themselves.

I’m a retired medical type, it’ll take a helluva lot more than that to offend me, particularly coming from a retired NCO. Dickweed, on the gripping hand, needs to find someone who cares, and it’s not me.

Oh, how cute. Its subscription to the ‘OK for Me, But Not For Thee’ propaganda rag is coming up for renewal, and it will get a month free if it can get a blog of Free Speech shut down in an eye-blink.

You ought to know by now that there is an entire generation, maybe three, of spoiled brat pinheads with the language skills of gravel pouring out of a dump truck, and the imaginative scope of a Dixie Cup fake ice cream treat.

Well, they won’t like my stuff or your stuff or anyone else’s stuff, but they forget one small thing about freedom: no one is forcing them to even look at it or acknowledge its existence. They limit themselves to a world that is no wider than their own thumbnails. Pity. Well, maybe not.

“Arbiters of taste” have been the bane of creative people since the dawn of time. I have no doubt the first artist to scratch a picture on a cave wall was assailed by someone who felt it was in some way “inappropriate”. I also have no doubt the artist told the critic to go fuck himself. Keep that proud tradition alive, Nicki.

As for the language on this site, it’s no worse than what I hear every day work. Compared to the company I kept when growing up, working around the guys on my grandfather’s roofing company, it’s a downright lovefest of highfalutin bluebloods. If you don’t like it, no one’s forcing you to join. In other words, move your mutherfuckin’ ass along to another damned site you whiny peckerhead.

The very last thing that would offend me is your language, Nicki. You’re quite creative in that area. I’ve learned some new ones I’d never even heard after nearly 50 years in the blue collar workforce here in Australia – and Aussies know how to swear, believe me! 😛

Seems Billie boy was asleep in Civics class- He missed the explanation that free speech means that there is NO SUCH THING as a “safe space” ( see the way South Park lampooned the concept. Lovely!)
Leon Jester- loved the Motey reference.

I admit that I now self-censor, A LOT. There are numerous reasons for it these days, a fair portion of which has to do with as a small time author I don’t want to attract any more trolls and attacks than I already get.
I got rid of my old blog completely, and nuked most of my LJ years ago, and am actually fairly tame (for me) on FB now.

Because I am just so tired of dealing with the asshats. Yes, I’ve had the threats, I’ve been stalked, I’ve even been assaulted. It just got to the point where I knew if I ever had to defend myself against one of these maniac’s, that I’d end up in court because I’m a ‘big scary guy’ (at least that’s what I’ve been told). And as we all know, the ‘big nasty looking’ guy is always guilty, and the weeping little slug is always innocent.

So good for you for standing up to these nimrods, who are always searching for insults. (One of my stalkers who has been wanting to kill me for years has yet to say -why- I hurt his feelings so, especially as we hadn’t met when he decided that he was going to shoot me someday – the one time we did meet in passing at a conference he was very very quiet. Didn’t even know it was him until he castigated me about it later for being ‘polite’ to him – I shit you not.)

Having grown up mostly among Dutch-speakers, I can be almost as potty-mouthed as Nicki if I want to. (The concept that mere words, rather than acts or concepts, can be obscene is something I’ve always had trouble wrapping my head around.) I had to learn to put a “volume control” on that in the USA. Generally it’s at 0 or 1, so that when I absolutely need to, I can crank it up for effect😉

I stumbled over this today. (No nudity involved. Nothing visually disturbing, other than words.)

Warning: Swallow all food or drink before going to this page. If you require blood-pressure medication, take it NOW or have it at hand. If you are in, or ever were in the military (ANY military), prepare to be astounded, and possibly enraged, by the ass-tardery.

Nicki’s naughty language is a feature, not a bug. A flavor intensifier. Not crudeness for crudeness’s sake, but a highly evolved rhetorical art form. I’ve learned many great new words here, especially nouns and modifiers. Grazie!

For political and personal reasons, I’ve tried hard to keep the saltiness in my own language to a minimum, but Lord above (yes, yes, I know) — it gets hard to resist the urge to whack these censorious cunt-faces with a barrage of razor-edged words intended make their slime-witch visages shrivel up in pruney horror. I’ve had repeated problems with far-left vermin abusively trying to silence my voice at supposedly “inclusive” websites, and by now, I’ve had it up to orbit with their incomprehensibly arrogant hypocrisy. Frankly, if the news were arrive over the airwaves that aliens from outer space had suddenly kidnapped all the leftists for gruesome and pointless medical experiments involving blowtorches and wood chippers, I’d break into a happy-prospector dance with lots of extra hops and jumps.

To be frank, after a 20 year career as a sailor, nothing anyone says could ever possibly be insulting. I’ve heard every swear word in ever imagined combination possible, and the protestations of “my feelz” just roll off my back like water.
Get a thicker fucking skin people, or get the fuck out. Either one will work.

“the First Amendment protects you from government prosecution if you dare speak out. However, demanding that someone whose speech you don’t like be silenced by anyone, be it an employer or a news aggregator, still makes you a petty little tyrannical fuck.)”

The problem, Nicki, is that assnuggets like this are a problem because the government has carefully crafted a legal system that allows private entities to be prosecuted by other private entities who don’t like their ideas. Why did Brandon Eich get fired? Because the company legal counsel pointed out that as long as he worked there, every government victim groupie could cite his presence as “proof of a pattern of bigotry leading to a hostile work environment and discrimination.” Because the Puppy Kickers can claim they’re made to feel “unsafe” and traumatized by the mere presence of certain people at the convention, so they’re allowed to remove them from their “open to the public” convention and call the cops to provide the muscle and weaponry they are too cowardly to use.

There was a fairly common poster back in the hippie days: “‘You have not converted a man because you have silenced him.’ – John, Viscount Morley, On Compromise, 1874”. It is odd that the inheritors of the hippies’ cultural revolution mantle now espouse the exact opposite.

ROFL Finally found a site where the commenters aren’t restricted from using the same language the mods use, right on!

As a former Navy man who spent years listening to people who take professional pride in their ability to swear, I guess I’ve lost the ability to care about guys who are so beta that they go out of their way to whine about those of us who curse. I try to tame my swearing around the kids, but when I’m on the road I’ve learned it helps me deal with the myriad douchebag drivers around me.

I tried to tame my swearing around my kids when they were younger, but they’d come home from school and spew such crap, I pretty much gave up on that idea, and instead, taught them when it is and is not appropriate to drop their various versions of the F-bomb.

I very nearly hit the screen as well, too funny. This guy apparently read something here, made a histrionic complaint and was shocked, SHOCKED I tell you to be met with derision and, um, oh that’s right, vitriol! What a maroon, thanks Nicki, you made my day.

When I was in third grade we used language that would easily be comparable to what I find here. As a matter of fact, had it been a factor at the time, we would have been referred to as South Park kids.

Billy Boy apparently didn’t have as much fun in third grade as he could have.

Back in the Dark Ages when I were a blogger, I used to get this shit all the time. “Your message would be so much more effective if you didn’t swear so much,” and suchlike. I just ignored it.

What I loved was when I was called “mean” and “hateful” when I suggested that the Republic, and our society in general, would be improved if Ted Kennedy were tied to a chair and beaten to death with a lead pipe. By comparison, Nicki, your blog is rainbows and unicorns.

Yeah, I used to get ‘if you swear, you lose your audience’ – but honestly, there are some people who wouldn’t like what I write anyway, and I lose them. Yet, there are people who enjoy what I write, so…

I think for some things, swearing helps – it has its place and serves to communicate emotional tone in a written medium. Stringing together the hilariously graphic and insulting invective serves to entertain; and frankly when I get to that point, it’s because there’s just so much stupid one needs to reduce that stupidity to the abject ridicule it’s entitled to. Insults exist for a reason, and I honestly greatly admire those who are able to wield both swearing insults and descriptive insults with surgical precision to eviscerate their targets or all too deserving victims.

Going to be contrarian.
Now based on reading you a few times, I can pretty much safely say you could care less about my opinion. But because I enjoy commenting sometimes hear it is.

I see nothing wrong with an Instapundit reader expressing their opinion to the owners/operators/managers of that particular site that Instapundit is linking to a site that the reader doesn’t like and is not positively reflecting on the Instapundit brand. Asking them not to link to you is not attempting to silence you. The Instapundit crew is free to ignore that particular reader’s opinion. Or if enough of their readers have a similar opinion about a particular linked to site, maybe they would ponder over that feedback.

Who Instapundit links to is important. It is their brand. It’s why I have been going to their site for years.

Do you want critical feedback? Maybe not, and that’s fine. It is YOUR site. As you noted in the Instapundit comment section “I (Ms. Nicki) don’t write to gain readership. I write, because it’s fun. I write to vent. I write for catharsis. Sometimes people read it. Sometimes, they don’t like it. I can’t exist to please every reader, and I refuse to do so.”

Finally, I simply don’t like the cursing. To quote an Instapundit commenter “I find crass language lazy (and I am guilty as the next guy, but I try my best to articulate myself without resorting to this sort of talk). The written word is much more deliberate, so a invective laced style is a conscious choice. I may be implying that Ms. Liberty should change her style, but that is up to her. She has a smart head on her shoulders, but she will make that decision. Making her change is anti-liberty. Disagreeing with her style is no crime.”

Now, I’ll hit the donate button for a small amount (cause I am cheap).

Hey, you know – as I said before, you’re free not to like the cursing and not to like my language. I realize not everyone will. I also don’t mind critical feedback, and I’m free to follow advice or not. I have quite the thick skin. I don’t need critical feedback on my language like a naughty 3rd grader. I know I sometimes curse. I’m aware. I do it quite intentionally. I’ve posted that particular fact quite a few times. I do prefer critical feedback on my ideas, but I also know people will sometimes not bother because a few f-bombs offend them. It happens.

Believe it or not, I write without cursing a lot. The majority of my writing you will never see, but this blog constitutes about a quarter of what I do, and I do quite a bit of writing without using a single bad word here as well. This one I did in 2002 that was part of a paper for my Master’s Degree is one example. Sometimes invective is appropriate, and sometimes it’s not. But here’s the thing, to me, it’s the height of arrogance to make demands of people who run a site to silence a voice you don’t like, or to come over and lecture someone who pays for their site and who puts quite a bit of effort into it how they should do it. “Please don’t link to this woman. She curses.” Really? Come on! And then he apparently came over here to lecture me on my language and was butthurt when he was met with derision. I find that distasteful. You don’t like something? Don’t read it. It’s simple. But demanding that others don’t link to you is akin to trying to silence them, and that’s not something I appreciate from anyone. (I mean “you” in the general sense).

As for Instapundit’s brand, I think Sarah knows what it is. She is, after all, one of the folks who “drive the bus,” so to speak. Sarah told me that Insty was always meant to be fun. Dr. Reynolds writes some serious, dignified articles, I do too, by the way. But Insty is different, and she’s happy to link to something that’s fun. Her take on it is that the complainant is obviously someone who hasn’t been around Instapundit a whole lot.

In any case, look I appreciate readers who come over here and make thoughtful comments such as yours. I appreciate readers who come over here and make me laugh. I even appreciate hemorrhoids like the one guy a few days ago who had his tongue permanently attached to Trump’s ass and wouldn’t leave well enough alone (although, those get old real quick!)

So feel free to comment. I’m also incredibly grateful for the donation, no matter what size, because that’s incredibly considerate and I know there are better places you could be sending your money. But do understand that there will be cursing at times, and that’s just who I am. I wouldn’t change for anyone.🙂

Don’t let the ignorant and high-handed twatwaffles get you down, NICKI! After all, the cure for those attempting to restrict free speech is More free speech! Keep up the good work. Salty language has never put me off and I have been known to become salty in language myself on occasion (Usually to make a point that thick-headed twatwaffle’s cannot understand using standard English!)

FWIW, I find your style somewhat refreshing. I certainly don’t visit every day, but always find myself smiling when I get redirected here via Instapundit or the like, if for no other reason than I know I’ll find only your bluntly honest assessment, which I often find humorous, even in the cases I disagree.

Also, here… Because if you’ve not seen it, I think you will appreciate the humor. Cheers!😀

My dad was career Air Force so I was taught this at a young age. Dad: “I believe in freedom of speech and will defend to the death your right to practice that weather I agree with what you are saying or not.” Now that is putting your money where your mouth is.

Rob

Hi, I'm Rob. I used to blog at Northern Virginia Conservative, but Nicki got way more hits anyhow, so I moved over here. My language is somewhat less colorful than hers, but I also get pretty passionate.

I'm a liberty Republican activist, and work in fundraising right now during the day.